


We'll Share a Seat on the Train

by trascendenza



Category: Psych
Genre: Character of Color, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-11
Updated: 2009-11-11
Packaged: 2017-10-05 13:37:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/42314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trascendenza/pseuds/trascendenza
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gus finally figures out why he watched The Lost Boys so many times. <em>Gus set down his burrito with a frown. "Oh, no. You did not just call He-Man gay."</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	We'll Share a Seat on the Train

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [commentathon](http://trascendenza.livejournal.com/355369.html) prompt "go on a date with me."

"Go on a date with me," Shawn said, leaning back in his desk chair. He had a rubber band stretching from one of his ears to the other, taut over the bridge of his nose. He _sproinged_ it with two fingers.

Gus' head appeared slowly from behind his laptop. "Excuse me?"

"Go on a date with me."

"Like a -- like a -- I mean, you mean, like a, you know, a thing where the two of us go out together, on, like, a --"

"Date. Yep."

Gus frowned. "Shawn, please. We're both straight."

Shawn had added two more rubber bands, and his eyes were popping out to what seemed to be dangerous proportions under the pressure. He twirled in his chair, flicking more rubber bands at the ceiling from the pack he had in his lap. "Your point being?"

"That we prefer to date women?" Gus said, because he was genuinely getting confused now.

"I don't see why that should stop us from going out and enjoying a lovely evening on the town." Shawn stopped twirling in the chair, pausing for a moment while he wobbled dizzily into sitting upright. He used his legs, rowing-style, to wheel over towards Gus. "C'mon, Gus, think about it. When was the last time you and I went out to a nice dinner, a little candlelight and a little jerk chicken, just the two of us, and really talked? We've been getting so caught up in our cases and stiflingly heterosexual lives that we've forgotten what it means to be _men_, to live wild and free like the majestic animals we are." His face was covered in red marks from where the rubber bands had cut off circulation and he did, in that moment, look a little bit like a wild beast.

"So this is like some kind of... male bonding exercise?" Gus said, desperately scrabbling for non-homoerotic footing.

"Exactly," Shawn said, laying a comforting hand on Gus' shoulder.

"Well... you know, the dinner part, that doesn't sound so bad..."

"A little guys' night out, if you will. Nothing out of the ordinary about that at all."

"And, you know, it has been awhile since we've had a chance to talk." Gus looked a little guilty. "Sorry about the other day at work, you know it's not that I didn't want to have lunch with you, it's just that sometimes I get so behind on my paperwork that I just have to put in the extra hours."

Shawn massaged Gus' shoulder. "I understand completely."

"Guys' Night Out, I like that. Yeah. That sounds good. As long as, you know," Gus was laughing his nervous too-high pitched laugh, "we don't call it a _date_ or anything, 'cause that'd just be silly."

Shawn stopped massaging. "Gus, my great idea is called 'Gus, Go on a Date With Me,' not 'Gus, Come and Heterosexually Hang Out With Me.' We do _that_ all the time. We've been friends for, like, seven thousand years, give or take a few centuries. Don't you think it's time we spiced things up a little?"

"Actually, I'm perfectly comfortable with the level of spice in our relationship right now."

Shawn sighed. "You would be."

"This conversation is over," Gus said, turning back to his poker game.

"_Au contraire, mi amigo_." Shawn said, smiling fondly at Gus. "It has just begun."

*

"Robert Schwarz," Shawn announced, jumping into Gus' bed and laying down beside him.

"What the hell --" Gus scrambled out from under his covers, sputtering, his cloud-pattern matching set pajamas all bunched up around his chest.

"Robert Schwarz," Shawn continued, as if they'd been in the middle of a conversation. "Sixth grade. I saw the way you looked at him."

"Bobby, yeah," Gus said. "Yeah, I remember him." He picked up his alarm clock and shoved it in Shawn's face. "Why the hell are we talking about Bobby at five o'clock in the morning instead of, oh, I don't know, _sleeping_? I have work in two hours."

"He was incredible, wasn't he? He struck that elusive yet perfect balance between the counter-culture badboy fashion of John Bender and the smooth, responsible good looks of Scott Baio." Shawn put a hand over his heart. "An inspiration, really."

Gus nodded a little, despite himself. "Everyone loved Bobby."

"Including you."

"Yeah, sure, he was a great guy."

"So you admit you had a crush on him." Shawn raised a finger. "That you may, in fact, still have one."

"A crush?" Gus spluttered, and it was a few minutes before he was really able to do anything else. "Shawn, really? You broke into my house at five in the morning to ask me if I had a crush on Bobby Schwarz from the sixth grade? This is really the conversation we're having right now?"

Shawn nodded. "This is really the conversation we're having right now."

"Well, for your information, I did _not_ have a crush on Bobby Schwarz. A crush," he scoffed, rolling his eyes so hard that that the his ocular muscles squeaked a little from the strain. "Please."

"I see."

"So we're done with all this date business, right?"

"One hundred percent absolutely yes. I can see now that I've been wasting your time."

"That's more like it," Gus said, nodding.

Shawn reached out and fluffed up Gus' pillow. "Go on, get comfy. You've got work in the morning. I'll tuck you in."

"Thank you, Shawn." Gus laid down again, scrunching his pillow into place under his neck and settling in again. He closed his eyes with a smile and a soft exhale.

A few minutes later he said, "Shawn."

"Yes?"

"Is that your hand?"

"Well, I'm pretty sure it's not my foot. Wait, let me double check." Gus yelped, jumping. "Yep, definitely not my foot."

"Out!" Gus cried, smacking Shawn with a pillow. "Out of my house!"

"Party pooper," Shawn said, climbing out of the bed. "I was about to shove my ice cold feet between your thighs, it was going to be _great._"

*

"And if you think I believe that you watched that movie for Jami Gertz, Gus, you have another thing coming."

"Ish anodder 'tink' coming, not anudder 'ting,'" Gus said around his toothbrush, "An I tought I tol you to get out of my housh."

"I'm pretty sure a powernap on the front stoop doesn't actually count as being _in_ the house. Also, another 'think' coming? How does that even make sense?"

Gus spit out a mouthful of toothpaste. "It makes perfect sense, Shawn. The phrase 'you have another think coming' was an intentional misuse of the word 'think' for comedic effect, and the subsequent replacement by the word 'thing' is what's referred to in linguist enthusiast circles as an 'eggcorn.'"

"Okay, a) it scares me that you know and/or care about these things, and b) now you've gone and made me hungry." He put two fingers to his temple. "I'm seeing scrambled eggs, yes, and... red, oh, Gus, it's so red, it's like blood! -- oh, wait, no, that's salsa, and... hang on, hang on..." He sniffed loudly. "And I'm smelling cayenne, oh, Gus, it's in my nostrils and it burns, it burns so deliciously good."

Gus spit out the mouthwash he'd been gargling. "Breakfast burritos sound good. Lemme just finish flossing."

*

"Anyway, you're tripping." Gus delicately wiped some salsa from the corner of his mouth. "Jami Gertz is fine."

"I'm not denying that. But you can't honestly expect me to believe that Kiefer Sutherland's mullet had nothing to do with your obsession." Shawn was sticking chips into the guacamole with careful attention. They formed a lopsided smiley face.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Dude. The giant poster you had in your room for, like, all of highschool? He was mullet-a-licious, Gus, which is actually a word that should not exist because it implies that there's something delicious about mullets and everyone knows that mullets taste like tears, lost innocence and burned toast."

"So what? He was a very compelling villain."

"So what? Gus, that movie was the gayest thing to come out of the '80s, and that is up to and including He-Man."

Gus set down his burrito with a frown. "Oh, no. You did not just call He-Man gay."

"You're joking. This is _news_ to you? I -- he _oiled_ his muscles, Gus, I really don't even know where to start --"

"Uh uh. I'm not hearing this." Gus crossed his arms over his chest and turned away.

"Oh, come on, don't you think that's just a little juvenile?"

Gus tilted his head. "Did I just hear something? Like this annoying voice casting aspersions on my childhood heroes?" He looked around the restaurant. "No?" He smiled and leaned back. "Guess I'll just have to sit here and enjoy the sweet sound of silence, then."

"C'MON, GUS, WHILE I APPRECIATE THE CONE OF HETEROSEXUAL SILENCE YOU'VE PUT AROUND YOURSELF, I'M NOT NECESSARILY SAYING HE-MAN WAS GAY. HE MIGHT HAVE BEEN BISEXUAL. THE ETERNIANS WERE A VERY LOVING AND OPEN PEOPLE, IF YOU CATCH MY DRIFT."

The entire diner went silent. All the patrons turned and stared at them, some with food halfway to their mouths. One young boy, in particular, looked intrigued.

Gus laughed, too loudly, saying "nothing to see here, nothing to see here," all the while sliding to the back of the booth and slowly lowering himself underneath the table.

Shawn looked around, surprised. "What, too much? Should I have just called him heteroflexible?"

*

"Wait a minute." Gus said at a stop light, turning to look at Shawn. "Does this mean you're not straight?"

"Ding ding ding ding, and the prize goes to Gus, Figuring Out the Blatantly Obvious for $700."

"Well, gee, Shawn, it's not like you ever _mentioned_ it before. I'm pretty sure I would have remembered."

"I have two words for you: Aaron Brocklebank."

"Aaron? I thought you guys were just... you know. Good friends."

Shawn blinked. "Really, Gus. I mean, really? You thought we just took showers together because we were 'good friends'?" He said the last part with exaggerated air quotes. "Plus, you walked in on us that one time when we were playing naked Twister. I figured the little queer boycat was pretty much out of the bag after that."

"Huh," Gus said eloquently, with the expression of a person who's been looking at a visual puzzle for hours that suddenly, with a tiny adjustment of perspective, clicks into place and becomes perfectly clear. "That was why you flinched every time you sat down during that first week you two started hanging out together, isn't it?"

"Ha ha," Shawn said, giving Gus a look. "Very funny."

Gus' face was twitching desperately as he tried not to smile. "Uh-huh. And all those jars of vaseline, _those_ weren't for your chapped elbows. I thought your skin looked surprisingly supple for someone buying so much of that stuff."

"_Anyway._ Speaking of bisexual people, why don't we play a game? It'll be fun. Raise your hand if you're bi!" Shawn raised his hand. He looked at Gus pointedly.

"I am _not_ bisexual, Shawn, don't even play."

"I don't know how to break this to you, man, but you're pretty much as bisexual as a mollusk, and those guys are the last stop on the bisexual train." He considered. "Actually, I think they even built the train."

"Out of what, ooze?"

"I never said it was a _fast_ train, Gus. Just that it was attracted to two different sexes and also that there were mollusks at the end."

"That's just great, Shawn. So now I'm onboard a train made of out slime and I share a sexual identity with slugs."

Shawn grinned. "Dude, your nutshelling skills? Sharp as a _tack_."

*

"Okay, look." Shawn lobbed the foam basketball at Gus. "We can settle this once and for all, right here, right now."

"Yeah, how?" Gus lobbed the ball, doing a little dance in his seat when he got all net.

Shawn swung around in his seat until he was facing away from his desk. He gestured. "Come here."

"No funny business, right?" Shawn nodded. Gus looked suspicious, but rolled his chair over anyway.

"Closer."

"I'm plenty close, Shawn."

"_Closer._"

Gus rolled his eyes, scooting closer, until their knees were brushing. "Happy?"

"Very. Now." Shawn put both his hands on Gus' shoulders. "I solemnly swear to you, Gus, that if I am wrong about this, not only will I stop offering to take you out on what, seriously, would be hands-down the best date of your life, but I will also personally sculpt you the bitchingest lifesize model of your head this side of the Mississippi. Actually, I might do that anyway. I'll probably make it out of whip cream."

"Shawn, there isn't a lifesize model of my head on the other side of the Mississippi."

"Even better. It'll be the bitchingest one in the _world_. You in?"

"You really promise to stop harassing me?"

"About this? Yes. About the fact that you own _The Pride &amp; Prejudice_ DVD? Never."

"Yeah, yeah. Let's do this."

"Okay. Now," Shawn tightened his grip on Gus' shoulders. He spoke very slowly and seriously. "I want you to look me in the eye, Gus, yes, that's very good, and I want you to tell me that you have never ever, not once in your whole entire life, dreamt about drinking out of Kiefer Sutherland's bottle of blood." Shawn leaned in, maintaining eye contact. "Be honest."

"I --" Gus' expressive features shifted through a number of different configurations in rapid succession: shock, shame, annoyance, denial, frustration, shame, panic, and a then just a little more shame for good measure.

"Go on," Shawn whispered, rubbing Gus' shoulders encouragingly. "This is me. Talk to me."

Gus' eyes were wide and he was shaking his head in his quick, bobble-headed way of his that was almost more of a vibration than a full motion.

Shawn nodded sympathetically. "You can tell me, Gus. Come on."

"Once," Gus said, "it was once, okay? But it doesn't mean anything."

"Whatever you need to tell yourself, buddy." Shawn gave his shoulders one last squeeze. "I'm here for you. We'll pick this back up after you've had a little time to think." He stood up and headed for the door. "You know where to find me."

"He was a very compelling villain!" Gus shouted after Shawn's retreating figure.

*

"You know what I think," Gus said as soon as a bleary-eyed Shawn opened his door.

Shawn yawned elaborately, scratching his chest. He was clad only in a pair of boxers. "That it's too early to be alive? I agree completely."

"I think that there's nothing wrong with finding some members of your own gender... aesthetically appealing." Gus said, adjusting his tie. He stepped in, looking energetic and fresh. "The fact that I've appreciated a few aesthetics over the years -- well, that's just a sign of a healthy, balanced mind." He was nodding as he spoke, agreeing with himself. "Yeah, in fact, you know who else did that? Alexander the Great. And he conquered like half the known world. Hans Christian Andersen. Angelina Jolie. Robert Downey Jr."

"I know I'd crawl in that big robot suit of sexy with him."

"Exactly. The way I see it, if being," Gus coughed a little, a slight sheen of sweat breaking out on his forehead, but he managed to get the word out, "bisexual was good enough for He-Man, I don't see why it's not good enough for me."

"See, buddy, now that's the way to look at it. It's all about perspective." He yawned again. "But, seriously, as great as this personal revelation is, you know how I feel about being conscious before the sun's up." He waggled his eyebrows. "So, back to my room for nakie snuggles and some hanky panky?"

Gus scoffed. "Please, you think it's going to be that easy? Payback is sweet, my friend. From this moment forward, you can consider my pants the Fort Knox of the Federated States of Guster." He leaned in, patting Shawn on the cheek with a smug smile. "Sleep well."

Gus turned on his heels and sauntered away.

"Wait, does this mean I'm Auric Goldfinger? Because I really don't think I have the belly for that. And playing the harp gives me carpal tunnel! Gus, c'mon, I have a better idea -- how about I be Kiefer and you be Jason Patric? I've have some kool-aid in the fridge that looks just like blood, if you squint and maybe have a few beers first. Gus? Gus! Gus, come on!"

He shook his head disappointedly when Gus disappeared from view. "And to think I offered him jerk chicken."

*

"Seriously, man. Tell me what I have to do." Shawn tossed his menu down with hardly a glance at it.

Gus kept perusing his, thoughtfully, running his fingers over the options and silently reading the French names of the entrees to himself. The candlelight set off the red of his tie very nicely. "What, to get inside Fort Knox?"

"No, to renew my library membership." Shawn flicked a small chunk of bread at him. Gus brushed it off his shoulder without looking away from his menu. "Yes, to get inside Fort Knox, although I can't tell you how stupid I feel calling it that. I'm really hoping that you're not keeping actual gold in there."

Gus smiled enigmatically. "You're not going to be finding out anytime soon."

"But our date has been awesome so far! Don't even try to deny it. You know that was the best game of laser tag you've ever played in your life. And winning you that giant teddy bear was, like, Most Classic Things to Do on a Date 101."

"No doubt. But you have to remember, Shawn, I'm not one of those girls you're going to talk into bed with your little fake psychic tricks and admittedly charming smile." He finished with his menu and folded it up, placing it at the corner of the table so the waiter could pick it up easily. "Besides, I'm just not that kind of guy."

"What, the kind who likes fun sexy times?"

"Call me old fashioned, but I believe in properly wooing someone."

"Did you just use the word wooing? In a serious, non-bodice ripping context?"

Gus smoothed down the front of his jacket, chin lifted. "Unashamedly."

Shawn snapped his fingers. "I knew I should have gone with the whalebone corset instead of the white undershirt."

"Laugh all you want, Shawn. But I will tell you one thing," Gus pointed the piece of bread he was holding at Shawn, "if we're gonna do this, we're gonna do it right. We've been friends too long to mess this up."

Shawn digested that for a moment, then nodded. "That's fair."

Gus looked surprised. "Really? That's it? No telling me not to be a crazy wombat or something?"

"Look, man. In all seriousness, I know this wasn't your idea, and if it doesn't work out, I mean, we're still gonna be friends, right, no matter what happens?"

Gus nodded in agreement. "No matter what."

"But I will say this. I just can't help thinking that... you and I... we... you know. We make a good team." Shawn was methodically ripping the slice of bread on his appetizer plate into tiny bits. "And that's, you know. That's good. And we're good. And I just think that we'd be... good... together." Shawn looked up, a little smirk on his face. "If we do it right."

Gus smiled. "Thank you, Shawn. I can't tell you how relieved I am to hear that." Then he looked a little embarrassed. "And, you know, it's not that I... I mean... it's not that I'm some kind of prude or something. This is all still so new for me. I can hardly wrap my brain around it."

Shawn put his hand over Gus'. "Look, bottom line: however this plays out, I'm gonna be here, okay?"

"Yeah." Gus let out a deep breath. "Yeah, I know."

Shawn's smile was practically incandescent. "Good. Now, let's discuss exactly what your definition of the word 'right' is, because I'd like to know where erotic couples massage falls on the list..."

*

"See you in the morning," Gus said, standing at the door to his apartment.

Shawn rocked back on his heels. "Yep, in the morning, that's when I'll see you."

"Right. So. I'm going to go in now."

"Mmmmhmm. Yes. Good."

"I'm putting my key in the lock."

"Roger that. The key has landed."

Gus took his key out of the lock, sighing. "Shawn, this is ridiculous."

"What, the part where we can't figure out if we're going to kiss or the part where you're narrating all of your actions to me like I can't see what's happening even though you're only two feet away from me?"

"Oh, for -- get over here."

Shawn made some sort of high-pitched sound, doing an arm dance. "I thought you'd never ask!" He slung his arms around Gus' neck, bracing himself, and jumped up.

Gus scrambled desperately to catch him, stumbling under the weight. "What the hell, Shawn? You call that an appropriate dive-in for a first kiss? You could have sprained one of my discs."

"The important part is, you didn't drop me. Now," he said, "shut up and enjoy the magic."

They looked at each other for a few seconds, and there was only this and a wall of silence all around them. Gus leaned in, tentatively, brushing his lips lightly against Shawn's, like he didn't know what to expect. Shawn's fingers wrapped around the back of Gus' neck and he adjusted to the angle, keeping things light until Gus opened his lips and made some sort of sound in the back of his throat. Gus' back _thudded_ against the wall with their combined weight, and the only sound was their sharp breathing and the rustle of their clothing as they shifted closer together.

A few minutes later, Shawn's pupils were dilated, his face was flushed, and he was staring at Gus incredulously. "Okay, dude, that? Totally worth waiting thirty years for."

Gus laughed, pulling him back in. "You know that's right."


End file.
